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Former deputy coroner testifies at murder trial
By PETER H. MILLIKEN
YOUNGSTOWN
Amber Zurcher’s 2002 death was a homicide by strangulation, a former Mahoning County deputy coroner testified.
However, Dr. Jesse Giles, the forensic pathologist who performed the autopsy on Zurcher on June 4, 2002, said he wasn’t sure what type of rope or cord was tightly wrapped at least four times around her neck to kill her.
Dr. Giles, who now works in Jacksonville, Fla., testified Monday in the fifth trial of Christopher Anderson, who is charged with killing Zurcher, 22, in her Compass West apartment in Austintown.
The trial, which began Aug. 2, continues at 9 a.m. today before a six-man, six-woman jury, with Judge James C. Evans of Mahoning County Common Pleas Court presiding.
“Something had been tied around her neck and bound down tightly,” Dr. Giles testified by video as he was questioned by Rebecca Doherty, assistant county prosecutor.
“What I see is some sort of smooth object that’s fairly narrow,” Dr. Giles said, referring to autopsy photos of red abrasions encircling Zurcher’s neck.
However, Dr. Giles said he saw no cross-hatching characteristic of a rope, nor did he see identifiable marks from an electric cord.
Zurcher did not die by hanging because the abrasions encircling her neck are horizontal and don’t slope upward, Dr. Giles observed.
“The neck injuries are at about the time of death and are the cause of death,” Dr. Giles said, estimating the time of Zurcher’s death about 4 a.m. June 3, 2002.
“There’s a significant amount of force applied,” Dr. Giles said, adding that someone strangled in this manner would lose consciousness within 15 seconds or less.
Her death was caused by “something tied down around her neck and pressed against her so she could not breathe, and then she died of lack of oxygen,” the pathologist explained in lay terms.
Anderson, 42, of South Main Street, Austintown, was one of several people who attended a party in Zurcher’s apartment. After everyone else left, Anderson returned and strangled Zurcher, prosecutors allege.
Anderson’s first trial in May 2003 was declared a mistrial because of “an unsolicited comment” from a witness.
Anderson’s second trial in November 2003 resulted in a conviction and a sentence of 15 years to life in prison, but the 7th District Court of Appeals overturned that conviction in September 2006, citing “cumulative error” in the trial.
A third trial in December 2008 ended with a hung jury.
A fourth attempt last April ended in a mistrial after a defense lawyer fell asleep in the courtroom during jury selection.